Chapter 7
Sammy
Humming, I moved the little sprig of green from the pot I’d brought from the house and over into the spot I’d prepared in my garden. As I planted the sprout, I tucked a little drop of magic in with it, burying it so the plant would flourish as it grew.
Working with the earth made me feel centered.
I drew the majority of my magic from nature, so it calmed my power and helped me think things through.
I’d been out in the garden all day after spending the remainder of the night and morning fretting over my late-night conversation with Blaze. It had done me a lot of good.
I felt calmer than I’d been in a solid week or more.
I reached for another sprout when my mood shifted dramatically. Anthony was worried. Rocking back on my heels, I focused on my alpha. He was in town and on top of the worry, he felt sadness—bone deep.
As soon as I homed in on him, I realized he was with Blaze, and Blaze’s emotions joined Anthony’s, pressing against my heart. Blaze’s distant familiarity made my skin crawl, but not necessarily in a bad way.
They were in town.
Wrapping my magic around me, I cloaked myself and moved to the park behind Main Street. Blaze stood staring at a tree like someone had hypnotized him, and Anthony’s emotions washed over me now that I was beside him. His heart was broken.
Blaze still felt distant. He was lost, deep within himself. I looked around, and when I saw nobody, released the cloaking.
This was my secret. I didn’t usually pop in on them quite so suddenly. I liked to get into position, then showed myself. More dramatic. Nowadays I did it without thinking. It hadn’t been my intent to scare them, not when they were this upset, but it was second nature at this point.
It was my duty to see to Anthony, but I stepped toward Blaze. He was in so much conflict. Confusion. Terror flashed across his face.
Before I knew really what I was doing, I grabbed Blaze’s face and pulled him down to my level. He didn’t even seem to notice. “Blaze,” I said in a growl. “Snap out of it. What in the hell has you so scared?”
His eyes finally focused. Blinking, he looked down at me, registering my presence for the first time. “When did you get here?”
“When did I— What the hell is wrong with you?” I let go of his face, pushing him away slightly as I did. “Where is the danger? Why do you reek of fear?”
Anthony answered for Blaze. “We need to get home.” He glanced around. In all the years I'd known Anthony, I'd never seen him so shaken. Even when he was a child, I never felt this level of discomfort coming from him. His voice shook as he said, “Seriously, can you help us get home?”
“Of course,” I said. “Did you bring your car?”
He nodded. “In front of Jace’s Place.”
That wasn’t a problem. I knew the area so well I could move whatever I wanted wherever I wanted it.
I suspected if I really put my mind to it, I could move a house.
But now wasn’t the time to think about that.
I focused for a moment and cloaked Anthony’s car, then poofed it from town to in front of his house.
Then I did the same for Anthony, Blaze, and me.
Blaze bent over, disoriented like he had been when we went to investigate the high priestess. “Come on.” I patted his back. “The more you do it, it’ll get better.”
Anthony turned around and spotted his car. His eyes widened. “How’d you do that?”
I rolled my eyes and walked up his porch steps. Why did he even ask anymore?
The house was empty, luckily. I perched on the edge of the couch with my arms crossed and waited for the two men to come in. They did slowly, with Blaze trudging and grasping his stomach and Anthony patting his back. “You really do get used to it eventually,” Antony said consolingly.
“Sit.” I tapped my foot and glared at them until they sighed and copped a squat. “Explain.”
Blaze stared into space, no help whatsoever while Anthony explained.
“I was showing Blaze around town,” Anthony said. “And we went to the park where you found us. He saw some initials carved into a tree and he seemed to lose himself somehow.”
Blaze turned his gaze toward me, looking like an overgrown lost little boy. “Do you remember what I said to you the other night?” I asked.
He nodded mutely.
“What?” Anthony asked.
My gaze still on Blaze, I spoke to Anthony. “I’ve been feeling these pricks of familiarity with Blaze. But I didn’t understand it. He felt like home, like Bluewater. As if he belonged here and with me. Like he came from here.”
Blaze kept shaking his head. “I’ve never been to Bluewater before Anthony drove me over the county lines.
” He set his lips and jaw stubbornly. He was adamant about it.
“I don’t know how I knew about the tree.
” His chest heaved and his feelings overwhelmed the room.
Blaze was angry, frustrated. He didn’t understand what was going on.
“Try to stay calm,” I said in a soft voice. I layered a sliver of magic in my words to help him chill.
It didn’t work, oddly.
“How can I stay calm?” he asked in a near-yell. “I’m having dreams about me and boys I’m supposed to know. I know I’m supposed to know them! The dreams feel like memories, but I can’t explain them!”
He was having a full-blown meltdown, so I didn’t hold his anger and lashing out against him.
That didn’t mean it was okay for it to continue, however. “Now hold on,” I said in a low, even voice. “If you yell at me again, I’ll turn your tongue into a toad.”
He snapped his mouth shut and stared at me, nostrils flaring.
The corners of his lips twitched just a bit.
He was about to laugh at the thought of having a frog for a tongue.
A laugh tickled the back of my throat, but I didn’t let it show.
I had half a mind to actually change the damn thing. It would serve him right.
“Tell me about your dreams,” Anthony said in a choked-up voice.
Blaze sucked in a deep breath, calming down and looking a bit less dazed. “I’m with two boys. Always the same two boys. And we’re spending time together because I’ll be leaving them soon. And it’s always sad and like I’ve been missing them so much.”
Anthony’s jaw worked as if he were swallowing repeatedly, but he didn’t speak.
“What was your life like as a child?” I asked, taking the focus off Anthony, who was clearly having a moment.
Blaze grunted. “Uh, I spent my childhood in foster care. I ended up shifting in my bedroom one night. Luckily, it was empty at the time and my foster brother wasn’t there. I messed up the furniture pretty bad, but at that age my dragon wasn’t too big, so it worked out, I guess.”
“I bet that was scary.” I tried the magic in my voice thing again, and it seemed to work this time. Blaze relaxed just a little bit more.
“I’d been so freaked out. But then, who the hell wouldn’t be freaked out?”
Anthony and I chuckled, but both of us sounded forced.
“Anyway, not long after that, a witch that lived in the town recognized me for what I was. She explained it all to me. I didn’t stick around but a few weeks after I knew.
I ran away, and she arranged for me to meet up with different clans and…
” he shrugged. “That’s when I started moving around.
Looking for clans. It took me about three years, but then, I met Gage.
He brought me to Grove Holler when I was eighteen and I’ve been there ever since. ”
Something wasn’t adding up. The visions I’d had of Blaze before I met him were mainly of his eyes and hair. They’d been so familiar to me, but once we met, that familiarity changed.
There was a puzzle. I needed the missing piece.
“Tell me about your childhood before foster care,” I said.
He scratched his head and leaned back on the sofa, looking tired.
“My childhood is fuzzy. I had parents, obviously, everyone does. But I can only slightly remember their faces.” He shook his head and shrugged.
“All I know is that one day I had parents and the next day I didn’t.
And I couldn’t really remember my time with them. ”
I sat up and moved to the coffee table, planting myself directly in front of Blaze. Grabbing his hands, I pulled him close and really studied his face for the first time. The freckles across his nose, that I hadn’t noticed before, connected with his eyes and hair.
The image of a little boy transposed itself in my mind and my heart broke.
I glanced at Anthony, who I was pretty sure had already put this together. “Do you have the clan photos?”
He nodded. “I do.” After crossing the room, he looked at a bookshelf, selected a book, and brought it back. He sat beside Blaze and flipped through the pictures. I touched the book and pushed a small bit of magic into it. The pages began to flip on their own until they found what I knew was there.
The book stopped moving. “Look,” I whispered. I didn’t have to glance down. I knew what I’d find. A picture of Jace, Anthony, and their friend Knox as children. Beside it, a picture of Knox and Anthony with their parents.
Blaze’s breath caught. “No,” he whispered, letting the book fall between his knees onto the floor. “This can’t be.”
The trepidation in the air changed to panic. Blaze’s eyes went wild, and a gut-deep fear settled over all of us. “I have to go,” he exclaimed. “I have to leave. Go home. I don’t belong here.”
“Blaze,” I said softly. “You do belong here.”
He glared at me with his fists clenched. “You don’t know shit about me, witch.” He snarled his lip. “This is somehow your doing. With your magic and tricks.”
I bristled, my spine straightening, but I kept my head. He was going through some major shit. Of course, he’d need someone to blame. It made sense.
“Witches should never mate outside their covens,” he said, voice raised. “They can too easily trick and deceive others with magic and love spells.”
I scoffed. Love spells were child’s play. I was far too advanced to fool with a love spell.
Blaze jumped to his feet. “It was a mistake, coming here.” He stepped around me. “I’m going home and forgetting about all of you.”
“Be sure that’s what you want,” I said, layering a warning in my voice. “Because I can make it happen.”
Just saying those words made my chest ache, but if that was truly what he wanted, I’d do it.
“Do it,” Blaze said between clenched teeth. “Get me out of here.”
But before I could move him to Grove Holler, he grunted and clutched his chest, then pressed his arm, where his clan tattoo was, our mating tattoo, to his heart.
My chest thumped in extreme pain as well, but I gritted my teeth against it.
It wouldn’t be as bad for me as for him.
“That’s the pain of you choosing to break our bond. ”
Stepping forward, I gripped Blaze’s arm as he pressed it to his chest. “I’ll be back.”
I moved Blaze and me to Grove Holler with Anthony’s voice ringing in my ears as he yelled for me to wait.